by Ciara Shayee
“Mamma, Sammy’s snugglin’ me!”
Tiny had become ‘Sammy’ shortly after joining the family. To be truthful, he wasn’t very small anymore, so ‘Tiny’ didn’t really fit. Despite being the runt of the litter at birth, he was now bigger than his sister by a fair bit, so Indie thought it fitting that he received a new name as he joined his new family.
After a vote, they decided on ‘Sammy.’
“He is, Tesoro. That’s ‘cause you’re his best buddy.”
Bodhi grinned widely. “I am?”
“You sure are,” Laker promised, tapping the end of his son’s nose.
The kids had been beyond happy when Grace and Ryan had brought them home to find Sammy there—Bodhi especially. It was strange, but Sammy and Bodhi had bonded just as hard as Faith and Marley. The quartet spent the majority of their time together, but they also paired off equally as often.
As she quickly snapped a few photos of Laker, the kids, and the puppies all bundled together, Indie couldn’t stifle her happy sigh.
The puppies were just as much hard work as the children, but they were also every bit as rewarding. There was nothing more beautiful than seeing her babies sitting on the couch with their spotty puppies sandwiched between them. Marley and Bodhi had never smiled as much as they did when they were around Faith and Sammy. They were noisy, messy, and time-consuming…but they were absolutely a wonderful addition to the family.
~ oOo ~
With a coffee in one hand and his video camera in the other, Reagan sighed and watched the bedlam unfolding in his living room.
The kids were all there—Carl-Roman, Chase, Marley, and Bodhi—so there were presents and torn wrapping paper strewn all over the place. Their parents were spread around the room with smiles on their faces and camera phones in hand ready to capture the excitement on the faces of their children. Faith and Sammy ran amok amongst the kids and toys, their excited yapping and sloppy kisses adding another layer of chaos to the wild morning.
Peter was on the floor with Chase, helping him unwrap a particularly trickily wrapped package. Reagan grinned and shook his head as he glanced over at Grace and Ryan cocooned in a blanket on the window seat. Idly, he wondered how long they’d make Peter wait for a grandchild of his own. He knew Peter was desperate for grandbabies, although he’d told Reagan he was content to dote on the other kids until they were ready.
Even Reagan wouldn’t have been upset if Indie and Laker chose to bless him with more grandchildren, despite already having four.
His eyes moved to Marley and Carl-Roman. They were kneeling together to open their presents, bright smiles on their faces as Sammy bounded over to ‘help.’ He adjusted his camera angle to catch them giggling at the puppy as he attempted to tear paper from one of Carl-Roman’s gifts and ended up somersaulting when he tugged too hard on the flimsy wrapping paper.
This…this was what he’d wished for.
When Indie and Grace were missing, and his family was broken, all Reagan wanted was to have the girls back. He wanted them to be happy, safe, and healthy. He wanted them whole.
He saw Archie settling down and starting a family and had been broken-hearted to think his daughter and Grace wouldn’t get to do the same. He’d held his grandsons minutes after their births and wondered if he’d ever get to hold Indie’s children—or even get to hold her again.
When he’d discovered that he had a granddaughter, a little girl born into a life of horror worse than Reagan had ever comprehended, he’d been sick with grief and loss. He’d missed those precious first years; he’d missed seeing his baby become a mother.
But now…
Now he got to see her healthy, happy, and loved. He got to watch her dote on her babies and he got to love on them himself. They lived under his roof and ran to greet him at the end of every day. They woke him up on Sunday mornings with their thumping footsteps on the hallway landing and ransacked his sweet jar on a regular basis.
But he loved it. Reagan loved each and every second of having his grandbabies close. He treasured his daughter’s smiles after such a long period of having to live without them. He delighted in seeing his childhood best friend so happy to have his own daughter back. Every day, Reagan got to have breakfast with Indie before kissing his grandbabies ‘goodbye’ and heading to work with his best friend, future son-in-law—because there was no way Laker would fail to put a ring on Indie’s finger at some point—and Ryan. He was fairly certain Archie was going to join Ashby-Davies Construction in the near future, too. His job as a security guard in Eastbourne was increasingly demanding of his time, and he’d voiced an interest in joining the family business; Reagan would leap at the chance to have his son come aboard.
“Oh, Pawpaw!”
He barked a laugh at Marley and Carl-Roman’s faces. They were slack-jawed and wide-eyed, the tickets he’d purchased clutched tight in their small hands. “So, you wanna go?”
The children waded through heaps of torn paper and quickly forgotten packs of socks. Reagan sank into a crouch and passed his video camera and coffee to Laker so he could hold Marley and Carl-Roman.
“We can go? Really, Pawpaw?”
Reagan felt his eyes prickling with tears. Only Peter knew what the tickets in Marley and Carl-Roman’s hands were for. “Sure, we can. I mean, every kid’s gotta go to Disney World, right?”
Indie gasped, her hand flying to cover her mouth. Ryan whooped, then whined when it earned him a gentle tap on the nose from Grace. Bodhi and Chase scampered across the room to join their siblings and pawpaw.
“Dad…” Indie breathed.
His eyes darted to her—a touch sheepish, but tear-filled nonetheless. “Uh, yeah. I wanted to mention it first, but I got a bit carried away, and I thought you might say ‘no,’ so I didn’t.”
She laughed a watery giggle. “You can’t…I mean, Dad—” she trailed off with a sigh. “Paris?”
Reagan plastered a big, pleading grin on his face and held his grandbabies close. She’s gonna kill me. “Florida.”
“Dad!”
~ oOo ~
By the time the adults got over the shock of Reagan’s surprise announcement that he and Peter were taking everyone to Florida for Easter, thanks to their business doing incredibly well this past year, the kids were ready to continue opening their other gifts.
While they got back to business tearing paper from presents, Indie pulled her dad aside.
“What the heck, Dad?” she hissed, tugging him out into the hallway.
He grinned, tucking a loose lock of her hair behind her ear. “If you missed something one of the kids did for the first time, would you be upset?”
Indie frowned, confused by his seemingly random train of thought. “I…uh, yeah, I would. Why?”
“I don’t want to miss their first ride on the teacups, or the first time they see Mickey Mouse. I don’t want to miss them seeing the magic of Disney World for the first time, Indie. I want to be there. I want to see it all. We’ve had some huge projects this past year and we’ve made a lot of sound investments too, Pete and I.” Reagan reached up to straighten his hair, his eyes soft as he gazed down at his daughter’s shocked face.
“Indie, let us do this. Let us spoil you all. If not for you, then for the babies. I never took Carl-Roman and Chase before we got you back because I didn’t want to. I wanted to wait until we could all see it. Now, we can. Let me do this, please.”
As Indie’s eyes swung into the living room, Reagan turned to follow her gaze, both of them laughing quietly when Bodhi found his Mickey Mouse ears and put them on his head—backward.
“Okay, Dad. Okay. But it’s too much. Way too much.”
Reagan chuckled, tugging her into his side for a cuddle. They remained in the doorway for a little while, watching the messy mayhem unfold until all the presents were opened and it was time for Reagan to baste the turkey again. He left Indie with a kiss to the temple and a murmured, “Love you, Indie.”
~ oOo ~
“All
right, all right! Quit fighting over the crackers, you two.”
Marley and Carl-Roman quit their squabbling, looking abashed as they mumbled apologies to Sarah. She sighed with an indulgent smile. “Here—one of you take my silver cracker.”
Marley beamed and accepted it with a grateful grin. “Thanks, Mimi! Look, Carl-Roman, we match!”
It had been some feat, getting everyone around the same table for Christmas dinner, but they’d just about managed it. The kids were wedged into the far corner, where there was less room but enough for them to squeeze in, and there were more people to each side of the table than was comfortable, but it was perfect.
Grace had gotten her family picture, just like last year. The canvassed image from their first Christmas home hung on the wall behind the table where they sat, everyone unable to resist commenting on how much everything had changed in twelve months.
They’d travelled to Italy and spent a month learning what it was to live and love without fear or worry.
Laker had declared his love for Indie, and in turn, set off the chain of events to make her realise she felt the same way about him.
Contessa had lost her husband; Laker, his beloved Nonno. She’d kept her home in Rome but moved into the bungalow she and Enrico normally let out to holidaymakers in East Dean, just a short car ride away from Eastbourne, where her doting grandson lived. She was spending Christmas in Italy, with her sister, but would be returning in time for the New Year.
Ryan and Grace had gotten engaged then married all within the space of six months.
Laker became Marley and Bodhi’s Daddy, at long last.
And Indie…
Indie had finally plucked up enough courage to admit just how madly, crazily, utterly in love with Laker she’d been for longer than even she realised.
They’d fallen head over heels for one another and settled into the normal life Indie had once said she never wanted.
Laker and Indie had welcomed two new babies into the family. Faith and Sammy were the perfect additions to the wonderful, mish-mashed chaos they knew and loved.
As Indie looked around the table at her friends, her family, she realised it wasn’t just her who’d had epiphanies this past year.
The twins had both gotten into serious relationships and would be heading off to university next summer; Heidi to study horse care, while Pippa went into childcare.
Grace and Ryan were hesitantly talking about trying to find a place of their own, now they were married and felt ready to take that next step together.
Peter was happier than Indie ever remembered him. He and Reagan had their ever-expanding business, and Peter finally had his three girls all together again. She knew he was sad at the thought of the twins heading off to university, but it would be tempered by having Grace and Ryan nearby still.
Archie and his boys were doing amazingly well. Indie stifled a smirk and chose to ignore Bodhi wiping his juice-smeared face with the back of his sleeve as she thought of her brother’s face when she caught him being sappy on the phone to his new girlfriend. Nobody had met her just yet because Archie was keeping this relationship close to his chest, but Indie could tell he was smitten. It was only a matter of time before he introduced his boys to her and her two children, and the rest of the family would follow in due course. Truthfully, she was just overjoyed to see him happy again—to see that wide grin back on his face instead of the lonely sadness clouding his dark eyes.
Reagan…Reagan was a law unto himself. Thinking about his incredibly extravagant gift of a two-week stint to Disney World later in the year made her want to throttle and kiss him in equal measure. It was far too much, but she understood his need to do it and wouldn’t begrudge him it.
However, she would talk Laker into giving him some money towards it, at the very least.
Laker.
Indie’s eyes swivelled to her right, where he sat. He’d been a bit quiet for the past hour or so since all the presents had been unwrapped and the paper had been tossed out, but he had a smile on his face and his arm resting along the back of her chair, his fingertips drawing little patterns up and down her side.
He was amazing. Everything she could ever have dreamed of as a friend, a partner, and a father for her babies. She was filled with love as she sighed and leaned into him.
“I love you,” she whispered, shivering at the intense look he shot her when he turned to gaze down at her and cup her face.
“Ti amo, mi amore.”
Smiling, Indie stretched up to plant a quick kiss on his lips.
“Ca-can we pull cwrackers, n-n-now?”
“Sure, handsome,” Grace laughed, managing to let Bodhi win when he held out a cracker for her to pull.
The rest of the table followed suit. Cheers were alternated with groans, laughter mingling with the excited yapping of the puppies following the muted bangs of the crackers. Sammy hadn’t heard them, obviously, but he’d seen his sister getting worked up and didn’t want to be left out of the action.
Sarah slid away from the table to soothe the puppies, settling them back in their shared basket nearby with a pair of treats.
Indie smiled as Laker reached for the cracker on her plate and held it out to her. His expression was far too serious for such a light-hearted moment.
“Are you scared you’ll lose?” she teased, getting a firm grip on her end of the sparkly blue cracker. She had the only one that wasn’t either silver or green, this year’s colour theme.
He frowned slightly, sucking in a deep breath. “A little.”
Indie got a funny feeling in the pit of her stomach. She held on tight and tugged hard when Laker murmured, “Here goes nothing.”
For the shortest moment, she couldn’t understand why everyone seemed so shocked that she’d won when she ended up holding the largest section of the cracker.
Then she realised it wasn’t her winning that made them gasp at all.
It was the prize that bounced out of the cracker and landed square in front of her on the table.
Indie could see the white box, but she couldn’t comprehend its significance at first.
Not until Laker slowly plucked it from the table, slid from his chair, and dropped to one knee beside her.
“Pie, mi amore, I’ve been planning what I’d say right now for weeks, but now that we’re here I don’t want to say any of it.”
“Laker…” she squeaked. “What...what are you doing?”
There were titters of laughter from across the table. Ryan.
“Little Sweet, Tesoro, come here please.”
Marley and Bodhi scampered out of their seats, sliding under the table to join their daddy. They were both wearing wide, toothy grins, their eyes sparkling.
“I’ve already asked these guys, and they’re in agreement. We should be a real family, right, guys?”
Marley and Bodhi nodded emphatically, putting a small but nervous smile on Laker’s face.
Indie wiped her clammy palms on her jeans and sucked in a shaky breath. Her heart felt like it was going to burst clean out of her chest, it was beating that fast. Her eyes widened and stung from the impending threat of tears as she watched him carefully open the velvet box to reveal the contents.
There were gasps all-around.
“Ooh, Daddy! That’s so pretty!” Marley sighed lovingly, craning her head to see it better.
Laker’s chuckle was tremulous. “Grazie, Little Sweet.”
It really was pretty. The ring had a thin, rose gold band with a large, sparkling stone in the centre. Little, clear stones—Indie was trying not to think of any of them as diamonds because of the price tag attached to such a purchase—fanned out around the centre stone, lending the ring a sunflower-like appearance. She couldn’t drag her eyes away from the beautiful piece of art long enough to check if Laker was serious and this was actually happening. He was on bended knee in front of their entire family, a ring in his hand and intent in his voice as he cleared his throat.
“Indie Scarlett Ash
by, you’re my best friend, the love of my life, and the reason for my existence. You’ve given me more than I could ever have hoped to have. You’ve brought light and laughter and love to my life, as well as our two, beautiful, crazy children—”
“A-and Sammy and F-Faith, D-Daddy!” Bodhi interjected.
Indie forced her gaze up to Laker’s face as he chuckled and leaned in to Eskimo kiss their son. “That’s right, Tesoro. And Sammy and Faith, of course.”
He turned back to Indie, his mint green eyes soft and hopeful. “Indie, mi amore, I love you more than life itself. You’re everything I want, and I can’t picture a single day of my life without you in it.”
Collectively, everyone seemed to hold their breath as Laker looked down for a moment before returning his gaze to Indie’s face.
“Will you do me the enormous honour of marrying me, Pie?”
He hadn’t finished speaking when the, “Yes, yes, of course, yes!” flew from her lips and she launched herself at his chest, almost knocking him clean over. Marley and Bodhi cheered with delight and danced around as everyone leapt from their chairs to congratulate the newly engaged couple. Laker scooped Indie into his arms to swing her in circles before they got too close, his grin exultant and the beauty of his happy eyes unparalleled.
“Yes?” he whispered.
She dashed tears from her cheeks and giggled, cupping his face. “Yes, silly man. Of course, I will!”
As their family gathered around them, he took the ring from its box and gently slid it into place on her left hand, grinning with a relieved sigh as it rested at the base of her finger.
It was a perfect fit.
~ oOo ~
Laker and Indie didn’t get a lot of alone time for the rest of the evening, but eventually, they snuck out into the garden under the guise of getting Sammy and Faith to do their before-bed wees.
The music playing in the living room was just about audible in the garden with the kitchen window ajar, so Laker folded Indie into his arms and swung her in loose, slow circles around the patio.